Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1930. INCIDENTS OF DEBATE

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 131, 1 December 1930, Page 8

Evening Post. MONDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1930. INCIDENTS OF DEBATE

The origin of the word "humbug," which first made its appearance in the language as a slang or cant term about 1750, is obscure, but its meaning to-day is familiar to everybody, and the Oxford Dictionary throws no fresh light on either of these points. Mr. Snowden's reference to the great book when feeling was running rather high over Mr. Thoma's's use of the word during the no-confi-dence debate on Thursday served nevertheless a very useful purpose, since it eased a tense position with a very good joke. Keferring to Mr. Thomas's use of the word "humbug" in regard to Mr. Bennett's proposals, he said ho had looked up the meaning of the word in Murray's Dictionary and had found that "this word is much in vogue with people of taste and fashion." If Mr. Snowden had had a serious purpose in view his quotation must have' been condemned as grossly garbled, for it refers to the circumstances of nearly two centuries ago, and even then was "rote Sarcastikful."- The full text, which is taken from the "Student" of January, 1751, and, represents apparently the first known use of the term, is as follows;1 — There is a word very much in vogue with the people of taste and fashion, which though it has not even the "penumbra" of a meaning, yet makes up the sum, total of the wit, sense, and judgement of the aforesaid people of taste and fashion! ... -I will venture to affirm that this Humbug is neither an English wbrd, nor a derivative from any other language. It is indeed a blackguard scrand, made use of by most people of distinction! It is a fine makeweight in conversation, and some great men deceive themselves- so egregiously as to think they mean something by Mr. Snowden was compelled, it will be seen, to garble his quotation, since the bulk of it and the whole purport of it would have given his friend away instead of helping him. It is, indeed, a curious example of the vagaries of language that on its introduction the word1 "humbug" should have been condemned by this critic as having "a blackguard sound" but no definite meaning. Both points are covered by ihe remark of another contemporary authority quoted by the Dictionary: When they talk of Humbug, etc., they seem to be jabbering in the uncouth dialect of the Huns. To-day there is certainly nothing uncouth or blackguardly about the word, and it has a perfectly definite meaning, which Mr. Snowden must have found to be defined as follows: 1 A thing which is not really what it pretends to be; an imposture, a deception, fraud, sham. There was nothing here to help Mr. Thomas, but, stripped of its sarcasm and its date, the 18th Century reference to the word as "much in vogue with the people of taste and fashion" was something much better than the best of definitions. It was a firstclass joke which provided angry passions with their best possible solvent. The humour of the implication that by his use of the term "humbug" Mr. Thomas had associated himself with people of taste and fashion was doubtless enhanced for the whole House by the fact that, though the silk hat with which Mi-. Mac Donald honoured his first call to Buckingham Palace has long ceased to annoy his party, the social aspirations of Mr. Thomas are a standing trouble. The same debate was distinguished by another' remarkable incident which, though under ordinary conditions it might have had ugly consequences, worked out just as happily. For some reason which is not stated a member of the Labour Party crossed the floor of the House during the division and struck Lord Winterton across the face with his order paper. As a soldier who served in Gallipoli, Palestine, and Arabia, and was twice mentioned in despatches, Lord Winterton is not to be suspected of any lack of courage or pugnacity, but he took a course which probably 90 per cent, of the most pacifically-minded men in the world would on the spur of the moment have failed to imitate. He did just what the British troops did in 1922 when the Turks were oozing into their lines in Chanak and heading for the Straits; he did nothing. As the man who had been hit took no notice, and the Speaker, who had no particular call to alertness when a division was in progress, had not seen the incident, there in ordinary course it would have ended. But the incident which had been given so strange a turn by Lord Winterton's self-restraint was then . turned still more strangely by his assailant. Apparently after the division had been taken, Mr. J. C. Simmons (Labour) rose and admitted the offence and tendered a sincere apology. Cheers followed from all parts of the House. *It was an interesting, instructive, and stirring episode which does honour to both parties, to the House of Commons, and to human nature. Many a Legislative Assembly must have been thrown into anger and confusion by a, less provocative insult than that with, which Mr. Simmons put himself in the wrong, and probably the House of Commons could furnish some examples. On the other hand, to what Assembly other than the House of Commons could one turn for a parallel to-so honourable a denouement of such an incident? And-it Tnayfbe that &feit4wth^kWE

history of the Mother of Parliaments parallels will not be easily found. The sense of fair play, of discipline, of corporate honour, has been developed for centuries in that Parliament, and in this case one of the new members, and a member of the party which least feels the restraints of tradition, reacted nobly to it at the last. But the more difficult part was that of the man whom he struck, and who must have had something higher than a Parliamentary or a national tradition to guide him when he accepted the blow as though it were one of the normal incidents of debate. The partisans of the old order, and the believers in "noblesse oblige" may rejoice to know that there was blue blood at the back of that chivalrous lead, but the ready appeal which it made to the chivalry of a representative of the new democracy is really a matter of greater concern.